


Defining Rose - A Series of One Shots

by CavannaRose



Series: Rose Wilson Fics [2]
Category: Deathstroke the Terminator (Comics), New Teen Titans, Teen Titans (Comics)
Genre: Angst, Blood and Gore, Canon-Typical Violence, Character Death, Domestic Violence, Drabble Collection, Emotional Manipulation, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Explicit Language, Father-Daughter Relationship, Gen, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, Loss, One Shot Collection, Physical Abuse, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-26
Updated: 2017-12-29
Packaged: 2018-04-23 10:56:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 12
Words: 6,031
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4874128
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CavannaRose/pseuds/CavannaRose
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Just a collection of one-shot stories where I try to figure out what makes Rose Wilson tick. Might add more characters later. Some of these are /really/ short.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Teacher

**Author's Note:**

> {{I don't own any of these characters and I make no money from this work}}

Rose knelt in the centre of the training room, her body leaning heavily on one katana, her lungs screaming for air. Several metres away lay her other blade, where it had been knocked from her grasp moments before; yet another humiliating defeat. A rough hand cupped her chin with surprising tenderness, and her face tilted up to meet the gaze of her father. The gentleness of his touch was almost as shattering as the disappointment in his gaze, particularly when compared with the cuts and bruises he had just finished inflicting on every inch of exposed skin. His voice stern, he spoke, sending a shiver down her spine.

"Not good enough, little girl. Get up and _try again_."

The girl known as Ravager bolted upright from her pallet of blankets, one trembling hand reaching for her phone, pressing the button on the side to light up the clock. 3am. The curse that escaped her lips was wobbly at best, and once again she thanked her solitary nature, she hated for anyone to see her weak. On trembling legs she stood, walking naked into the bathroom to splash water on her face. The dreams were getting worse, more vivid. This time she could almost smell him, the musk of sweat and smoke with an undercurrent of old blood and metal. She stared into the mirror, sitting on the counter since her medicine cabinet no longer had a door. The wear and tear of so many sleepless nights stared bitterly back into her single eye. Her lips were chewed ragged, scabbed and worn down to a few bare layers of skin, the bruising and bagging built up beneath it making her eye a washed-out blue. With an angry grunt she punched the wall beside the sink, crashing through the drywall with a dull thud. She pulled her now bleeding hand back, shaking droplets of blood amidst the white powder and the shards of the mirror that had once been mounted above the sink.

Abruptly the white haired young woman pivoted on her heel, moving out of the closet-sized lavatory and grabbing her uniform, pulling on each piece carefully, belting and strapping it into place. The routine was familiar, soothing. Finally all that was left was the mask, she held it in her hand for a long moment before tying it over her face. She would take this symbol of her father's and make it her own. He wouldn't be allowed to control her anymore, not even in her sleep... even if that meant never sleeping again.


	2. Blowing Off Steam

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rose goes hunting in the night.

The young woman tucks a shocking strand of white hair into the band of her eye patch, attempting to keep it out of her mouth. Standing perfectly still on the dark rooftop, she allows the salty breeze off the harbour ease her turbulent mind. Gradually the frown lines eased from her brow, this was her peaceful place, she let it clear her mind, centering her on her mission.

Rose felt her muscles relax, her senses heightening as the nonsensical emotions quietly took the place at the back of her mind, ignored. Grounded once more, she climbs down the side of the building, moving through the darkened streets like a big cat stalking it's prey. The streets seemed oddly quiet this night, so Ravager turned her attention towards the docks. Perhaps some fun lurked in that direction. Slowing as the sounds of low voices up ahead catch her ear, her lips twitch in the beginning of a smile. She tugged the iconic, dual coloured mask from her pocket, pulling it on before drawing her twin katanas. Whisper quiet she moved down the dock, flitting amidst the shadows and shipping crates.

Muscles tense, she springs to the top of nearby crate, a small puff of air escaping as she lands slightly harder than expected. She freezes. Certain she wasn't heard, she peers over the edge of the shipping crates, gauging the scene below her. Sighing in disappointment, she slices a katana through the air, cutting a hanging crate loose to crash loudly beside her quarry. She glared down at the frightened teenagers, cans of spray paint scattered on the ground in front of them.

"You have _got_ to be kidding me, psycho clowns, half robot monsters, and what I get are delinquents out past curfew? Scram!" She watches the teens scatter into the night, then perches on the edge of her shipping container. Rose can't help but chuckle. She sheathed her blades carefully and headed back for her flat. Clearly tonight she would have to be satisfied with sparring alone.

~*~*~*~~*

Rolling her shoulders to work out the kinks, Rose settled herself cross-legged onto the floor, trying to clear her mind. A million thoughts jumbled across her brain, rageguiltangerfearragelosssadnesshaterage. One after another, each clamoring for her attention all at once. About a minute later she stood back up, shaking herself off. How the fuck had Eddie managed this meditation bullshite? He'd always made it looks so bloody easy. With a frown she paced the room up and down a few times, before drawing her blades and testing their edged on her thumb for about the hundredth time. If she sharpened them any more today she risked seriously notching the blades. She just couldn't settle, couldn't stay still. It was, after all, the anniversary of his death... how could she be expected to behave like a human being?  
  
With a discontented sigh, she settled herself into the first position of a modified blade dance, one sword straight in front of her, the other parallel and slightly back, above her head with her arm bent. She started the pattern slowly, each step carefully laid, each pose held until she felt it in her muscles, until they screamed with the effort not to shake. Gradually she picked up the pace, until her katanas were merely a blur of reflective silver moving around her. Here was her meditation, in the familiar forms, the scream of protesting muscles, the slickness of sweat plastering her hair to her forehead and the back of her neck. Finally her brain quieted, all those unwanted thoughts and emotions lost in the dance of death and pain. The faster and more fiercely her blades sliced through the air, the calmer she became. This was where she belonged. Not the solemn solitude of the easy mind, but the whirling violence of flesh and steel. She went through the patterns of the dance three, maybe four dozen times, building a fine sheen of sweat across her chest and brow.  When her lungs were struggling for air, she slowed minutely, ending in an elaborate spinning flourish, her face glowing with contentment. Now she was relaxed. Now her mind was clear for another few moments in time.


	3. Searching

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rose seeks a missing part of the puzzle.

  
Rose sat on the floor of her empty flat, her laptop perched upon an upturned milk carton in front of her, newspaper clippings strewn about. Fingers flying across the keys, brow furrowed in fierce concentration, she would occasionally pause to glance at a headline on the floor. Her frown deepened, she clicked a few links, and then pushed the computer away in disgust.

"Another dead end." She stood slowly, stiff from hours sitting on the floor. Gracefully she moved across the room to a small fridge. Pulling out a soda, she takes a sip and then put it aside, too worked up to settle. She drifted back across the room, picking up a blurry photo from a foreign newspaper.

"Where _are_ you. I know you're not dead." Ravager punches a nearby wall in frustration. She just couldn't get her head straight this morning. There had to be another lead, a clue she was missing. If only she was as good a hunter as she was a swordswoman. Ravager moves out onto her balcony to think, taking a long draw off a cigarette. Why did the world have to piss her off so much?

She moved back inside, settling down to return to her research, tiptapping at the keys until it was the only sound in the room. For maybe half an hour it continues, until Ravager lets out a frustrated growl and throws her computer across the room, finding some small solace in the sounds of it's destruction. The mission, such as it was, was going nowhere. Detective work just wasn't her strong suit. She stares at the pile of ruined electronics and sighs, gathering up the pieces in a black garbage bag. Rose needed out of here. Actually, a cigarette sounds fucking perfect right now. Pocketing a spare lighter she heads back outside, time to clear her head with some fresh air... again.  _I miss Kid Devil, I never had to carry a lighter when he was around, and he wasn't a pretentious arsewipe_. She blows a chain of smoke rings.

The cigarette having cleared her head and calmed her down, Rose stalks back into the depressingly shabby flat, turning to look back through the glass door for a moment, and then turning her focus back to work. She bent down to the broken laptop and extracted the thumb drive from the shattered hull, pocketing it safely. Moving through to the bathroom she the lifted the corner of the bathtub, pulling a wad of bills out. It was time to go computer shopping again.


	4. Hands On Research

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rose gets violent.

Ravager approached the seedy bar with a sneer. Her source suggested the info she needed could be acquired within. Katanas bared, she kicks open the door, enjoying the momentary quiet astonishment as she scanned the room. There. Visual lock on her target. She pointed a blade at the man in the fancy suit.

"I have some questions, and you _are_ going to answer them." The silence hung for a moment longer, and then the room erupted into chaos. Rose grinned.

"The hard way then? My favourite." The fray converges upon her, and she moves. Blades clanging against wooden chairs and other impromptu weaponry. She laughs, matching blows with a thin, goateed man. His speed and precision making the battle truly enjoyable. Seeing her opening, her blade slices across his Achilles tendon and the man goes down. She turns, choosing her next dance partners. A matched pair of muscular ladies makes the decision for her, charging in. She ducks their blows, moving inside the reach of one. With a well-placed kick to the jugular, the female titan is downed, and Ravager turns to it's now enraged twin. Bringing her blades down she slices across the female's shoulder, using the momentum to backflip behind her and strike again from the rear.

Movement in the corner of the room, and she catches the well-dressed man ducking out the back. "Oh no you don't..."

She flows through the fray, allowing instinct to place her blows until she's on the other side of the fracas. She had already come this far, she wouldn't lose her prey for the pleasure of a bar room brawl. She burst through the back entrance, just in time to see the man get into a running vehicle. Cursing she pursues to the street. Frustrated, Ravager notes the license plate and the direction of the car. She'd found the snake once, she could do it again. For now, she returned to the brawl to work out her frustration.

It had taken her a full day, but she'd finally tracked down the guy in the nice suit. The license plate that had really made the difference. Ravager was surprised the vehicle he'd made his getaway in was his own. Then again, the man was small potatoes, not a big player. Rose pulled her hair up and slid her mask on. Today. She would get her answers today, and that weaselly fucker would give them to her. Ravager drew both her katanas and marched up to the small time crook's door, kicking it in.

"Alright Small Tony, you better come out." Ravager would not let herself be distracted. She smiled beneath her mask at the thug.

"Aw, we brought a gun to a sword fight. Cute." Tony stared down the barrel of his gun at her.

"Why are you following me around, Ravager." She dropped into a fighting stance.

"You know." Slowly she advanced on her prey, moving slowly. "You've seen her, tell me where and you can leave here with all your limbs intact." Ravager ducked and rolled as Tony began shooting. She barreled down the hall, taking a shot to the shoulder before connecting with the thug. She let out a grunt of effort as they both hit the ground. She was on her feet in a second, kicking at Tony's gun hand. He dropped the weapon, rising with her discarded katana in his other hand. Ravager backed up a step, gesturing him forward.

"Let's dance." She kept her injured arm in close, blade crossing in elaborate patterns as Tony struggled just to block. Rose whirled, dodging behind Tony to drag her blade across the back of his knees, and the goon hit the floor once more. She knocked her other blade from his hand, picking it up and aiming both at his throat.

"Now talk." An hour later Ravager left the building, pausing to clean her blood-soaked blades on the lawn.  
  



	5. Jogging

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rose takes a jog and ends up musing by where Eddie was buried.

Rose stood perfectly still on her balcony, the breeze blowing into her nearly empty flat. She closed her eye and popped in her headphones. Flipping her music to something hard and edgy to match her mood, she turns and slams the glass door shut. With practiced motions she flips over the side of the balcony, dropping onto the fire exit below. One last controlled fall and she was on the ground.

It took her a moment to regain her balance, but as soon as she had she was off. Her feet beat a steady staccato against the pavement, slamming along in time to the aggressive metal music in her ears. She looked neither right nor left, her feet taking her down familiar paths as she drove her body harder and harder, her chest soon heaving. She felt weakness in her body, hampering her momentum. The place where the dagger grazed her ribs, where the bullet had lodged in her thigh. Still she pushed on, harder and harder. Her lungs struggled to keep the oxygen flowing as she hit the city limits. Ignoring the aches and pains she lengthened her strides, the wind now biting, causing her eye to water.

Finally, what seemed like forever later, she slowed, eventually decelerating to a brisk walk, one hand pressed to the cramp in her side. She paused and took in her surroundings, her face grim. It had been.. a very long time since she had been here. It had taken her significantly less time to get here this time than the last time she had come. She wasn't sure if that was a good thing. She moved towards the tree she had climbed, what seemed like forever ago, and dragged herself into the branches.

Below was a graveyard, one she'd never attended a funeral at. To be honest, only one had ever been held here that she would have considered. She had been in Moscow when the story hit the news, the details had been sparse, sparser still when filtered through to the Russians. She had known. It wasn't hard to figure out who it had been, she'd felt the dagger through her heart all the way across the world. Even the arctic cold hadn't bitten as hard. Even the brutal attack on her life hadn't shaken her so deeply as one foolish heroic action. Idly she wondered if they took down the monuments of those that returned, or if they still stood, waiting for the tenant's eventual return.

She had cried then, and couldn't remember crying since. It was as if something inside her she hadn't known still lived, died that day. Perhaps that was what had thrown her off lately. Emotions long buried stirred to life within her, and she struggled to quash them. Every emotion was a weakness she couldn't... _wouldn't_ afford. Why did it have to be now? A small smirk flickered across her face. It was now because it was inconvenient, that was how. 

Somehow, he always knew when she was at her least human, knew when she was closest to becoming the monster her father wished her to be.  She sighed and dropped out of the tree, casting one last gaze over the silent graves below. It didn't matter what he saw in her, there would never be a place for her here, not amidst souls that noble. Her fate lay in other places. She blew a kiss out over the wind and turned to make her slow progress home, if you could call her barren shelter such a thing.  
  



	6. More Nightmares

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So many struggles

Even with her abilities, exhaustion eventually caught up with her.  She had fallen into her cot still dressed, immediately passing out as soon as her head hit what passed as a pillow. It didn't take long for the nightmares to begin. The scene was hauntingly familiar, but distorted by time and emotion. Even her memories played her false. It only drifted further from reality the longer she slept. In reaction, she began to fuss, tossing and turning on the thin mattress.

She stood in front of Joey, swords locked in combat. His eyes were a violent red, his face contorted with hatred. "Now now, Rosie, you wouldn't kill your own brother, would you?" She knew this couldn't be real, Joey had been quiet and kind, but the sibilant voice dripping with malice echoed in her head. Still she broke away, stumbling backwards.

The dream changed and her father stood over her, protective, his sword through Joey's chest. Rose struggled against the dream, refusing to see what it wished to torment her with. Joey's eyes were clear. Slade's were full of love and regret, and she just wanted to wake up from the horror, but all she could do was look away.

The scene changed again, she was running through the halls of Titan's Tower. Behind every door she opened stood a former team mate, eyes aglow with the same demonic possession that had warped her brother. Her sleeping body thrashed, strangled sobs escaping her throat as she twisted beneath her thin sheets. She couldn't wake up. Cassie, M'gann, Dick, Kal... One after another she fought their dopplegangers in her sleep.

Each death became more difficult, but just as she paused at a door, refusing to go further. Her father's voice came from the background, filled with warmth and pride, encouraging her on. Her hand shook as she reached for the final door. Back in her room she had a stranglehold on the blanket. Her body half twisted off the pallet as she fought her dreams. The sobs from her throat became cries of deep emotional pain and loss.

There he was, his eyes the same malevolent red as all the others, but somehow this was worse. Her heart beat faster, love choking her. The twisted look of disdain on his face made him nearly unrecognizable, he'd never looked at her like that before. Not even when he'd found her on the floor, collapsed from adrenaline abuse. She couldn't look, couldn't accept it, not from Eddie.

She raised her shaking blades, and suddenly her father was beside her. "That's my precious girl, you can do it." Her shriek of refusal rocketed her into consciousness, sweat plastering her hair to her forehead. Desperately she lunged forward, coming up with a blade in each hand, eye wild with terror and confusion. She stood there, panting, for long moments before sinking to her knees on the floor.

"None of it was real... None of it was real..." She dropped her blades, pressed her hands to her face, and broke out into deep, soul-rending sobs.


	7. Three Shorts

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Just a triplet of very short pieces. Too short to be their own chapters, but they kinda flow like a single day so... -shrugs-

Rose blearily stumbles around her kitchenette. For once she had gotten too much sleep, and only one thing could clear her head. "Coffee..." " _Hah, and some of these idiots think I'm a bitch on a regular day. Aren't they in for a treat today_. Coffee consumed, Rose heads over to her work out space. This is why she wouldn't accept Tim's offer to move back into the Tower. There could be nothing worse than cheerful 'friends' interrupting her morning routine. Best to keep her own place. "I don't think there's enough coffee in the world to make this morning tolerable."

~*~*~*~~*~*~*~*

Rose dragged the laptop closer to her face, tap-tapping keys to bring up the file. Her eye narrowed in concentration, replaying the video. She almost thought... but she just couldn't tell. She clicked on the image. "Damnit, how the hell do I make this clearer? It looks so easy in those shitty movies BB watches." She snarls, tossing the laptop aside. All she wanted was some concrete proof, was that so much to ask for? She shoves her way to her feet, moving through the empty little flat and into the bathroom.

She leaned heavily on the sink, staring into the open medicine cabinet. Two inhalers sat there, taunting her. A hand shaking she reached for the adrenaline, remembering the lasting effects it had on her system when she used it before. Perhaps just once to galvanize her ability, tap into this mostly unexplored facet of her abilities in support of her most dearly held goal.. Rose clenched her fist. Fighting for self control. It had taken months to repair the damage to her heart the last time she'd dabbled. But she wanted to know... The secrets locked inside her brain could be the very answers she struggled so hard for... Rose closes a hand over one of the inhalers, tucking it into her jacket. Not yet... but soon. Adjusting her eye patch she hits the street.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Rose grunted and swung another punch at the bag dangling in front of her. shaking out her hand before swinging a second time. She grunted, cracking her knuckles and taking another shot, each blow landing in the same place as the one before. The gym was quiet at this time of day, and the dull beat of the music in her ears drove her harder, helped her focus. She grimaced, picking up the pace of her blows, back and forth, building up a healthy sweat and working out some aggression. Her latest contract was floating at a dead end, her own personal mission was unfurling slower that washing out a shite stain, and she didn't know what her father was up to. Add to that Tim's respect for her request to back off, she was running out of outlets for all this rage built up inside her. So, despite her best intentions, she headed down to Grant's gym, letting the motorcycle ride over clear some of her head.

 

 


	8. A Contract

Rose scrolled through her text messages, ignoring several from her so-called friends and former team mates. She wasn't interested in talking to anyone. What she wanted was something quick, local, and violent. There. That was the one. A quick assassination. A point that needed to be proven. Perfect. Quickly she strapped on her katanas and headed for her bike. 

The ride to the edge of Gotham helped her clear her mind. Focus. Perhaps someone who had once been a Teen Titan should reach for more than odd jobs and hits from the morass of villainy that plagued the area, but in her mind at least she was only ever driving her blades through bad people this way. Still, part of her hated that she was accepting contracts from scum like Sionis and Cobblepot. 

Two blocks down she pulled the mask over her face, tying it tightly. Why wear the mask when everyone knew whom she was? Intimidation. Always use every tool at your disposal, and a masked figure breaking into your room at night had certain classic elements that evoked the right response. 

Under cover of the darkness, path barely lit by the street lights she crept through the target's yard, scaling the side of his house with ease. These large stone-brick facings were such a blessing to the would-be assassin. The careful application of a dagger tip had the window pried open and the slim, pale-haired girl slid inside. 

Creeping through the lavish halls of the man's home, Rose had to shake her head. What was the point of it all? You collect all this useless junk, and then you still die. None of it was useful, and some poor fucker was going to have to sort through all this shite and try to get rid of it. Honestly, killing this fucker was a public service at this point.

She eased open the door, moving across the carpeted floor like a ghost. For one, shining moment she stood poised over his bed, watching the corpulent man breath in and out. A trail of of drool trailed down his stubbly chin. Reaching out she dragged the blanket down further, revealing the thick hair on his flabby chest. Best not to get her blades caught in all this fabric. 

Drawing her katanas Rose closed her eye, giving a moment's thanks that this job went off so cleanly, and then drove both blades through his chest. A small smile tilted up her lips as his eyes flew open, conscious long enough just to realize it was all over. In the fractured moonlight she watched the life drain from the fuckers eyes. Wiping the blood from her blades on his blankets she placed a single black rose on the centre of his chest. Her job was done, the message sent. 

She left quickly and quietly the same way she had gone in, pulling off her mask and tucking it away as she tore through the streets of Gotham. She was getting paid, and what she wanted more than anything right now was a stiff drink.


	9. Fickle Friendships

Rose didn't go far after fighting with Blackfire. Despite the harsh overreactions of the warrior, she was still worried about the Tamaranean's daughter. Children were precious and needed to be protected. 

She perched on a nearby rooftop, watching to see what the group would do. Komand'r's words kept echoing through her mind, weighing on her, preying on her own insecurities. She had finally started trusting the other woman with a part of herself, and this was how that was rewarded? 

The one-eyed girl spat. This was why she never let anyone close. It was better to be alone, to step back and watch people ebb and flow around you, never letting anyone close. She felt hurt, betrayed... but mostly she felt stupid. She knew better than to let someone close enough to hurt her. She'd been trained better. 

One hand reached up, adjusting her eye patch. No wonder Slade felt she was such a disappointment. Standing, she made a decision. Enough was enough. Time to get back to basics, to do the task she had been so carefully molded for. No more foolish children's games.


	10. Infiltration

Gotham was a hard city to establish oneself in, but a good place to go if you didn't care to be found. Though she cycled through more than a few places in her field of work, if her father was on another of his 'family should work together' kicks she retreated to the dismal slums of the gothic city. The first thing she always did was stake a claim in Crime Alley, clearing a radius of at least a block, freeing it from the scum and trash that haunted the worst neighbourhood in a place drowning in crime. She and the lowlifes had an understanding, they stay off her turf, she stayed off their back.

The key to Rose's success amidst the dregs of society was the fact that no one was ever sure whose side she was on, besides her own. She'd fought beside both heroes and villains in her time, and since nobody ever paused to check her motivation, she was considered a wild card. A freelance agent. Something a step below an antihero, even, since not all her activities had a motivation that sent her up amidst the angels. Rose didn't care though, not what anyone thought of her, except that they leave her alone.

Unfortunately, there were elements trudging through the morass of criminality infesting Gotham that didn't get Ravager's rather violently posted memo about her territory and their infringement of it. A rash of crimes spread with little regard to the constant turf wars of the more prominent denizens, never mind the lesser known rats scrabbling in their wake. Several violent acts went down on the one-eyed mercenary's turf, which was not to be tolerated.

It only took one altercation for her to figure out something wasn't right. The average mugger wasn't up to trading blows with her serum-enhanced abilities, but these fuckers fought like their synapses had been blown. This was something bigger than just a gang, and Rose needed answers. Though she wasn't entirely sure if her motivation was a piece of the pie, or tearing the little group apart from the roots out, she went in. Here she wouldn't go as Ravager, but as Rose Wilson. One eyed mercenary with twin blades and a gun at her hip. They didn't need a masked mercenary, they needed a weapon.

Infiltration. The slow game had never been her best, but she was uniquely suited to groups like these. She could roll with the criminals, kill and deal and all that shite without a twinge of conscience, as long as her own goals were being met. So maybe this wasn't a paying gig, but who knew whether that would be the case all the way through? Tumbling herself among the lower ranking filth, she found herself a position within the crew. As she had expected, they were always looking for someone who could fight, and since she didn't seem adverse to partaking of the drugs alongside the thugs, who was going to suspect her? One of the more enlightened of the crew even recognized her as Deathstroke's daughter, the rumour that she was known for her drug problems soon circulating the group.

After that she was one of them, sent out on missions and supplied with her own rancid little patch for her jacket, and a supply of whatever the fuck the white shit was. Still, maybe it was because she was female, or maybe because she had been a hero of a sort at one point, she never saw anyone too high up in the organization. Not the suppliers, not the boss, and not the nebulous Them that organized the whole shit and shebang. Her job was to find out how far this went, how much was the hearsay of uneducated minions, and who she had to kill to keep this crap and these creeps off her street.


	11. Memory

She remembers everything. Every longing look when he thought she wasn't looking. Every gentle touch. Every tear in his eyes when they fought about how she kept destroying herself. Each moment in his presence echoed across the hollow places inside of her. She wasn't a fool. She'd known what he wanted from her, back when they were two stupid kids. He never could understand that she just didn't have it inside her. That part of her was missing. A chasm at her centre that was as barren as the life her father had imagined for her.

 

Sometimes there were flashes, a warmth from the darkness that was almost recognizable. That's how she knew he was special. Something more than another idle amusement. He reached parts of her she never knew she even had, but even that was never enough. It was anathema to her nature, that warmth, that softness. He was a demon on the outside, but she was the demon when you dug a little deeper. Not hot like he was, but cold... cold like the deepest depths of Dante's hell.

 

She thought she was broken... knew it, deep inside that place where the bones of her mistakes rattled and moaned. He could make her feel guilt, shame... things she rarely associated with her own actions. It was his gift, it was why she always gave in. There was something special about him... he made her feel less like a tin soldier, more like a three dimensional figure. A real girl. Figures it would take a Devil to burn out the ugliness inside her and make her truly live.

 

There was a light inside him, and it kindled something within her. It made her wish she was different, wish she was that person he always seemed to see when he looked at her, those strange eyes of his softening. The feeling it stirred inside her... it wasn't quite love, nothing that foreign. But there was trust there. Companionship. A kind of longing she couldn't describe. 

 

And then it was gone. He was gone.

 

She wasn't there. She'd left him behind. Not one of the assholes on that team looked out for him the way she had. Not one even tried to talk him out of the fool idea. They just let him go... sacrifice himself. As if he wasn't worth as much as the rest of them. As if he wasn't better than all of them. 

 

Her fault. She should have been there. He'd always been there when she needed him, but she'd walked out. Now he was gone. Now she was empty once more. Another tin soldier, weapon in hand. Emotionless, hollow inside. Without him she was just a weapon. He had been her softer side. He'd believed she could be a person. He had been her conscience, and now he was gone. One more loss she wouldn't let herself mourn. One more crack in her fragile sanity. Once more she echoed inside, and no one was there to fill the silence.


	12. Unspoken

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Not from Rose's perspective, but about Rose.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: 3 things he could never tell her

He could never tell her that she had the most honest smile he had ever seen. She didn't smile often, but when she did, the whole world better watch out. White teeth gleamed and the sound of her laughter was deep and smooth, like caramel treats laced with rock salt. Sweet and savory, just like she was. No one could resist her smiles, and her laughter spread through whomever she had welcomed into her tightly knit circle. She was so good at keeping people out, but when she let you in, it was like the sun shone from her lips.

He could never tell her how much he hated that pink tank top. It was like a lie stretched across her chest. He knew she wore it like a mask of femininity and innocence, but what it really represented was the girl she could never be again. She used it to tease and entice, flexing her muscles and taunting all the boys into trying to match her speed and strength. Seeing her in that stupid shirt made his heart hurt for her, because he knew she only wore it when she wanted to crush something inside of herself. If he was bolder, he would have lit the thing on fire. If he was a better friend, he would have told her.

He could never tell her how hard it was to say no, that last night. The sunset was the most beautiful he'd ever seen, glimmering off her hair and her earnestness. He'd never heard her ask anyone for anything. There was no teasing, no flirtation, just an honest plea. He couldn't do it, there was so much more he had to accomplish, but it tore his heart to pieces. He convinced himself that he might have been able to stay, but he should have known better. She had exposed herself when she asked him to join her, and she wouldn't risk doing it again. Not her. It was the hardest choice he'd ever made, worse for that tingling suspicion that it had been the wrong choice. Maybe not wrong for him, but maybe wrong for her.

He could never tell her, because he was dead. She was going to have to go on living without him, and his last thought was that maybe it was his fault.

**Author's Note:**

> {{What did we think? Any recommendations/requests?}}


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